Changing the arm on a 1210 Mk5

[Michielius]

Hi,

Ammonite Acoustics have an offer on just now at £570 inc the collar I think.

Mike.

Just had a look at it. It's indeed including the improved collar. Sounds like a very good offer, I would say. I read that they have just one left. Not sure whether you need an extra spacer (so bolt length will be 25mm then, I guess). As far as I know you don't, but there's a thread on using this arm on a 1200 here: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showt...Melody-tonearm

By the way: this arm doesn't come with an external arm cable with 5-pin DIN connector, so you need to order one separately. At Ammonite they offer a Black Rhodium cable for 350. But for that kind of money I would go for the ISOkinetic Silver Melody 2 tonearm cable, which is also 350 at Analogue Seduction. This one should match perfectly with the internal wiring, not sure about the Black Rhodium. The ISOkinetic cable uses pure silver wiring (like the internal wiring), the Black Rhodium uses silver plated copper. If 350 is too much, there are also cheaper alternatives like the Oyaide PA-2075 DR (265) or at a real budget the Jelco JAC-502 (85), both available in the UK at mains-cables-r-us.

I think for this kind of money (the Silver Melody arm with the Silver Melody cable will cost you 920) you will have a more than excellent arm and ditto cable for a very reasonable price.

[Ammonite Audio]

A spacer ring is certainly not needed with a Technics. Although I have no experience of the Isokinetik silver cable, I'd agree broadly with what's said above, except that the Jelco cable is a pretty miserable sounding thing (I owned one once), but that aside the Black Rhodium Stylus is the only one that I have actual and positive experience of - it's a really good, natural sounding cable, with capacitance pretty much as low as you can get, so that could be a factor if using moving magnet cartridges. It has been reviewed favourable by Paul Rigby here http://www.theaudiophileman.com/#!bl...um-stylus/cx8y . I am not allowed to discount Black Rhodium products, but I can certainly put together an enticing 'bundle' price with a tonearm. Yannis Tome sells a good quality basic cable that uses Van Damme microphone cable, at an astonishingly low price ( see http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Van-Damme-...MAAOSw8d9UuOTg ) and that would be my choice if funds are tight.

[mikeyb]

Again, thanks to both of you for your help and info, I've still to make my mind up which way to go, £600 is really top of my budget, and that's my head talking not my heart as money isn't an issue, but I'm not sure if spending £900 or so on an arm will be much of a gain over say the Melody arm and one of the Van Damme cables.

I still have a phono stage to buy to match my ZU Denon 103 which at the moment sounds great through the built in mc stage on my TQ Claymore amp, so a stage will hopefully improve it further still.

In fact I'm awaiting return of my Claymore 2 back from service and I might just run with that and sell the TQ which would gain me around £1000 back into the kitty, that would help greatly so that I wasn't dipping into any of the household money if you know what I mean.

Once this amp returns this week and I get a listen to it I'll see a clearer path, it did seem to really drive my PMC's well and I've recently moved them to the other end of the room which has really helped the soundstage and sound, the soundstage is almost like surround as I now hear certain pieces of music right beside my ears at about 4m from the speakers, this is mostly due to the ZU cartridge as I don't get it using my 2m Blue.

So my plan is this:

Setup my Claymore 2 amp when it arrives.

Try it with the 2m Blue and NVA Phono 2 MM stage which I have on demo.

Try my ZU 103 mc cart direct into both the TQ and Mark 2 Claymore amps ( I don't have an mc stage just now )

Return the NVA stage and get it changed to mc to match the ZU 103, then have a listen when it returns.

THEN..... I'll maybe make my bloomin mind up about an arm lol.

[Michielius]

You're most welcome. All the different arm options can make your head spin, I know. With your budget, the ISOkinetic arm paired with the Van Damme cable sure sounds as the way to go. Should also be a great match with your ZU 103. Including armboard total cost will be slightly over 600, though. Cables can always be updated in a later stage, when funds allow it.

To me it seems a very wise decision to first sort things out with the amp and pre-amp in order to set the budget for the arm. Good luck with all the listening and reviewing, and don't forget to enjoy it I might add! Keep us informed, I'm curious about which arm it will be eventually

[CageyH]

£600 will probably get you a nice Japanese vintage arm, and give you enough t get it fettled by J7.
I think that is where I would put my money.